More Transitions and Dawn Communicates

Dawn and I had a short work session this morning - it was already hot and steamy. We worked on transitions, walk/trot/walk and walk/halt/walk - our main goal was to work on staying soft through the transitions - both of us. I also worked on my focus to help make the transitions smoother and more precise - think the new rhythm, breathe out and transition immediately and smoothly, up or down, without a gap. In the process, we confirmed our softening work at the trot - it's pretty solid - and also threw in some backing, which is getting better every day. The work went well, with substantial progress on not bracing through the transitions and making them precise and flowing. Dawn was pretty forward this morning after having been in a good part of yesterday due to the heat. At some points in trot she wanted to push and rush, but came back pretty easily - I need to remember to make use of circles to help her rebalance and not rush.

Then, before we both got wringing wet, we took a little jaunt up the trail about 100 yards, and started working on the "just standing around" exercise I like to use for building patience and calmness. We would walk 20 yards or so and then halt on a loose rein. After standing still for a few seconds - this is about all Dawn can do and the objective is for her to stand willingly rather than for me to hold her there, and we'll increase the time standing as she's able - we'd move on to another spot and repeat. We did this both going away from the barn and coming back. Dawn is very interactive and asks questions and expresses opinions - when we halted on the trail, she would turn her head slightly and look back at me: "you want me to stand still? on the trail?".

At lunchtime, I went to check on the horses due to the heat. The mares were in the far pasture, and only looked up briefly when I called to them. It was pretty clear that they wanted to stay out despite the heat - they remembered having come in early yesterday. So I turned around and walked back in. Just as I got to the gate nearest the barn, Dawn came trotting up behind me. She went up to the water tank and took a big drink. She was somewhat sweaty, so I thought she wanted in. I was holding the halter in my hand waiting for her to finish drinking. She lifted her head, I took a step towards her with the halter, and she spun in place and galloped back to the pasture! She's never hard to catch when I want to catch her, so I was happy enough to accept her opinion of things on this occasion.